In cooking roasts, the meat is generally in contact with the bottom of the cooking pan, resulting in a sticking of the meat to the pan as it cooks. The result usually is a scorched pan and an under- or unevenly-cooked meat portion. Any gravy formed during the cooking is generally wasted since it is singed with the bottom portion of the meat. More likely, the gravy that is formed is not available to the cook since to remove the gravy usually means removing the meat first. This causes the lengthening of the cooking time and an interruption in the uniform cooking of the meat. The meat generally remains immersed in the meat juices or grease, and has a tendency to reabsorb the grease flowing around it. If the moisture content of the meat is low, the lower portion of the roast is, in effect, fried to a crust. If the moisture content of the meat is high, the lower part of the roast is stewed in the meat juices and grease, and much flavor is lost.
Not only is the meat not properly and uniformly cooked, but contact with the bottom of the cooking pan causes a difficult cleaning problem. The scorched meat contacted portion of the pan requires scoruing and substantial rubbing with cleaning pads or soap to remove the scorched crust formed thereby. As noted above, the gravy and grease usually burn away or are absorbed by the meat portion when the roast or poultry is in direct contact with the bottom of the cooking pan. Thus, prior cooking devices where the roast is in contact with the pan causes the constant rise in the rendered liquid constituents resulting from the cooking operation. This results in grease saturation of the lower portion of the roast, heat charring of the meat and pan, and consequent sticking of the roast to the receptacle where heat concentration is relatively great.
There are known apparatus for holding the meat above the bottom of the cooking vessel; however, many of these are integral with the pan itself and these raised portions are themselves scorched or encrusted by the grease formed. Also being fixed to the pan, these support portions cannot be used if meat is to be cooked in portions at variance with the size of the pan. Other devices used during roasting of meats are expensive to manufacture and awkward to use. Those movable supports that have been used are generally sharp ended or pointed metal that could cause a safety problem. Because of these drawbacks, few meat support devices have attained any marked commercial success.